China vows 'forceful' measures after U.S.-Taiwan meeting

Chinese vessels were engaged in a joint patrol and inspection operation in the Taiwan Strait that will last three days.

China vowed reprisals against Taiwan after a meeting between the United States House speaker and the island's president, saying Thursday that the U.S. was on a “wrong and dangerous road.”

Speaker Kevin McCarthy hosted Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen on Wednesday in a show of U.S. support for the self-governed island, which China claims as its own, along with a bipartisan delegation of more than a dozen U.S. lawmakers.

The Biden administration maintains there is nothing provocative about the visit by Tsai, which is the latest of a half dozen to the U.S. Yet it comes as the U.S.-China relationship has fallen to historic lows, with U.S. support for Taiwan one of the main points of difference between the two powers.

But the formal trappings of the meeting, and the senior rank of some of the elected officials in the delegation from Congress, could lead China to view it as an escalation. No speaker is known to have met with a Taiwanese president on U.S. soil since the U.S. broke off formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan in 1979.

In response to the meeting, Beijing said in a statement issued early morning by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that it would take “resolute and forceful measures to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

It urged the U.S. “not to walk further down a wrong and dangerous road.”

In December, China’s military sent 71 planes and seven ships toward Taiwan in a 24-hour display of force after expressing anger at Taiwan-related provisions in a U.S. annual defense spending bill. China’s military pressure campaign on Taiwan has intensified in recent years, and the Communist Party has sent planes or ships toward the island on a near-daily basis.